Wayback Weaving

One of the buried treasures I found in the last round of move-my-stuff was this small-loom weaving I did in a workshop at French General in… 2014. (Here)

The original intent was to make a pincushion - it only lacked having the tails woven in - so I ironed interfacing over the side tails to hold them in place, 

glued a small piece of Soft and Stable to the backing to (hopefully) keep pins from sticking me through, sewed it up and trimmed off the yarn tails - no weaving-in required!

Turning it right-side out was tough. It’s so small - only 2x4” - and the fabric so thick, I couldn’t do it by hand. Hemostat to the rescue! It was still a chore but it worked. 

Stuffed it with walnut shells, glued and hand-stitched the last side closed and voilá! Another tiny pincushion for my collection.

It’s lumpy and bumpy and not very tidy - it was definitely prettier as a flat weaving - but I like it and it’s useful. Bonus - it brings back some truly great memories. 

Cushions and Critters

I planned to make myself a ‘name’ pincushion… eventually, 

but I found this flower fabric while digging thru the scrap baskets and….

couldn’t resist. 

The FPP pattern is “Rectangular Economy Block” by Thimbles and Needles in the 3x6” size. 

Definitely going to make another, smaller, one soon. So easy and fun. Gotta use up those pounds of walnut shells!

Leo and Jaclyn now have chickens 

and rabbits. The bunny on the right reminded me of butterscotch, so that’s what they named her. 😍

Donovan found a friend while on a home-school field trip. 

They found a cave, crab, octopus and more in the tidal pools. 

So cool, even if he had to leave his new buddy behind. 

Petite Pretty Pincushions

I took the selvedges I mentioned in the last post and made… 

See the fussy cut fish on the top ‘thread’??

pincushions! 

Teeny tiny little 3” thread spool pin holders.

Back of “Debbie” - love Laurel Burch!

The pattern is “Quilty Friends Quilt Label Block” by Happy Sew Lucky

which I reduced by 50% (because I’m crazy…)

“Debbie” is made from sales samples ⬆️ ⬇️ somebody gave me… 10? more? years ago.

Both the top and bottom pieces are lined with Pellon SF101 light interfacing for more structure. (Also hoping it keeps the pins from sticking out the underside. Ouch!)

I redid the top of “Reyna” three times - could not get the thread lines to look straight - before throwing in the towel, ripping out the center section and remaking the rest. Annoying but worth it.

They’re stuffed with crushed walnut shells and the smallest bag I could find without paying the ‘craft tax’ was 4 pounds. Anybody want a pincushion or six?? (Craft tax - prices per ounce are significantly higher because it’s smaller amounts for crafters. 😡)

Once stuffed, I glued the last section of seam shut (note for next time: genius idea!) and ladder-stitched it together. Would I make these again? Heck yes - but maybe just a bit bigger. 

More notes for next time: add borders so the spool design is more prominent; leave off the zig-zag bit under the name tag-don’t need it; use 60 weight thread and a size 70 machine needle. 

Gift Sewing

Not a lot going on here. Donovan is visiting for a week while mom and dad go house hunting in S. Carolina (wahhhhhhh 😭), plus my current project is a gift so no pics yet… which all adds up to a big lack of blogging material. 

I’ve been working on organizing my Big Bin of Selvages. I’d asked a few friends to save selvage strips from their quilts for me, planning to cut and sew them into words for… quilt labels? captions on blocks? just for fun? They came through in a big way so I’m sorting and ironing and planning.

The original idea came from posts on Instagram and, like a lot of social media stuff, it looked easier than it is. Things to remember - bigger letters are definitely better. Words with extra space between letters (kerning?) are great. Strips with less than a generous 1/4” of fabric above and below the letters are mostly unusable. Black letters are too common (it’s slowly changing but most selvages have black ink on white fabric) - hoard those colorful letters! Use a glue pen to hold letters in place for sewing. 

A friend said the end product looks like a ransom note. 😂 She’s not wrong!

The Birds Are Back

The holidays threw me off track on the Birdwatchers Project

so Sunday I spent most of the afternoon making the head of January’s Atlantic Puffin (the most complicated part)

10 x 21”

and last night finishing up the rest. Isn’t he handsome?

Next up - either December’s Northern Flicker

or November’s Purple Gallinule. Hoping to have both done before February’s project is released. (And very glad they are small-ish projects, unlike the huge 21 x 33” Green Heron!! Here)

More Winter Wonderland

Remember December’s Winter Wonderland project? (Here)

Teena’s blocks

Teena and I were having so much fun, we decided to continue it on as a block a month project, with the goal of a bigger completed quilt by next Christmas. 

January’s block was Elf Legs by Full Bobbin Designs.  

Love my argyle socks

Great pattern, easy instructions and both blocks turned out super cute.

Next month we may do Frosty, by the same designer… but we’ve got a list of at least 20 blocks we’d like to make so who knows what we’ll feel like when February rolls around. 

Change of Plan

Today was the final checkup from my cataract surgery, hooray!

I didn’t realize they planned to dilate my eyes, which was fine, but required a change of plan for the afternoon.

Since I value my fingers, cutting and sewing fabric got put off till tomorrow 

and I went with hubby and grandson’s favorite plan - fresh baked cinnamon rolls*. Yummmmmmmm. 

* My fav fast and easy recipe: Sally’s Baking Addiction Easy Cinnamon Rolls From Scratch. Not quite as good as my long-time favorite (my opinion; the boys think these are excellent) but Sally’s don’t take a full 8 hours to make either.